Please, for the love of god, if you are building an application, make it unique in some discoverable way.

This rant has its roots in the group text messaging market that for some reason or another is currently exploding.  I've literally had to install/uninstall a plethora of these apps

1. GroupMe
2. Beluga

 on my phone.  The above two mentioned are the only apps that remain.  I've installed several as every friend seems to be using a different app when creating a new group.  More alarming, is that I keep getting invites to new and newer group sms applications with no end in sight.  

The consumer in me gets pissed when upon inspection I can't discern what makes the latest group sms chat apps any different then the previous four hundred I have installed/tried/been invited to.  As far as I can tell they all do the exact same thing.  

So, if you are building a group sms chat app or, any app for that matter, please make it different.  Then, make it very easy for me to understand what makes your product better then the rest.

PS.  Also, stop building group SMS chat applications.  Seriously, one was enough.

One amazing outcome from this years StartupBus competition was each team reaching the semi-finals produced a MVP (Minimum Viable Product).  A MVP is simply defined as

A  product that has just those features that allow the product to be deployed and no more

The teams having an MVP were able to launch, attract users and, begin getting feedback on their product or service.  A few examples of teams that accomplished this year are

• Lemonade Stand
• Bouncr
• WalkIn
• Profile.io

As you can see, anyone can begin immediately using their products.  

What really excited me was that some of these companies went even further and produce more then just an MVP.  They produced a Minimum Viable Business (MVB).

A Minimum Viable Business can be defined as

A business that has just those attributes that allow the business to begin gaining paying customers, users and no more.

I refrain from defining attribute other then it is something directly related to the business gaining paying customers.  These attributes allowed your business to launch, acquire revenue, so you can begin iterating on the business.  This allows you to leverage your revenue in shaping both your business and product. 

This is just the tip of the iceberg on what I and others like Elias Bizannes are thinking about.  I just wanted to get something written down.  As I explore this concept more, bounce it off a few people smarter then myself, I'll write more.

I attended last nights community meeting simply out of curiosity.  I have no say in the matter beyond what I've already expressed before.  However, one of the main take a ways I had last night, which I didn't expect, is that a lot of people were mad JumpStart rejected their idea.  

This baffles me, as the only constant in a start-up is rejection.  In fact, rejection is the best thing that can happen.  Through rejection you hone your idea and yourself.  Additionally, if you make it, actual users and customers will reject your idea.  Even better, they might tell you why they are rejecting it.  Those rejections are not just invaluable, they necessary and, for fact going to happen. 

So if you are mad and willing to sit on the sidelines because your idea got rejected you need to seriously ask yourself if you have the stomach for this.    

If you're spending a lot of time talking about JumpStart and how they are spending their fund, you're focusing on the wrong thing.  

For those out of the loop, there's a town-hall style meeting tonight where apparently the Cleveland community is going to "lash out" about how JumpStart, a local Cleveland start-up incubator, is spending their fund.  However, everyone is completely missing the real point, Cleveland only has one incubator with a legitimate fund.

This is a big problem for Cleveland.  With a nationwide start-up talent crunch and, a looming drought in applications to all incubators, Cleveland is becoming less and less competitive nationally.  We simply cannot compete against YCombinator, Capital Factory, Tech-Stars, Founders Institute and, Sand Hill Rd.  

If we can't compete for new, exciting and innovative start-ups then we wont be able to compete for top start-up talent.  This will continue to rapidly degrade so long Cleveland is a one-trick pony.  Cleveland needs a plethora of legitimate funds.  Then, if one fund is "flaking", the "market" will take care of itself.  A lot of funds means a lot of start-ups and, we become more attractive on the talent market.  No different then in the Valley, New York City, et-cetera.

So please stop talking about JumpStart and start figuring out how we can get more incubators, accelerators and investment firms funding start-ups in Cleveland.

Another year, another amazing experience on the StartupBus.  I knew this year was going to be different, one part because I was on the planning organization.  However, with the StartupBus expanding to six cities (Cleveland, Chicago, Miami, New York, Palo Alto and San Francisco) with 160 buspreneur's as a national competition where each city competes for the title of the next Silicon Valley, definately made it different.  Little did I know that these differences would make this years event a media storm.

This year was so succesfull major media outlets such as Wired, BusinessInsider, New York Times, Huffington Post and more heralded the StartupBus as 

the greatest thing to happen to SxSW in the last few years.  

and it has left me absolutely speechless.  Still forty-eight hours later I still haven't digested this.  It definately made those months of working through the night leading upto the event worth it.  Wow.  

On the heels of this succes we don't know exactly where we are going to take the StartupBus next however, we have some big ideas and with this year's event have set the bar really high.  

Lastly, if you read at least on article about the StartupBus, read this article by Wired found here.  It captures all that is the StartupBus.

I'm excited to announce that Mom and Pop Co-ops will be moving into the 2011 StartupBus finals.   Please follow the #startupbus hashtag for this evenings UStream information so you can watch.

I'm pleased to announce that the 2011 Cleveland StartupBus semi-finalists are

• Mom and Pop Co-ops
• Sapling

Both of these teams are offering an innovative product, rocked a MMP while on the bus and, continued to market, iterate and, make a presence down here at South by Southwest.  I think CNN said it best when they said

You can't tell the difference between a company coming off the bus vs any of the other early companies marketing here in Austin.

Please check out their products and give them any and all feedback.  Lastly, wish them luck!

What an exciting trip this has been.  After the six busses bus spent two and a half days traveling south to the largest technology conference in the world, the teams have remained focused and continued to work on their ideas here in Austin.  While rapidly iterating and promoting their ideas to the SxSWi attendees the teams have been able to obtain valuable feeback and adoption.  Passing by them on the street you can't tell the difference betwween a StartupBus company and all the other early stage Silicon Valley companies trying to make a splash here in Austin.

So today, all that hard work promoting, researching and building should pay off because today, we announce the twelve semi-finalists.  Two teams from each bus will be announced exactly one hour before they have to compete against one another on stage by presenting and demo'ing their product.  A judging panel of tech startup veterans will listen, ask questions, provide feedback and, ultimately decide our six finalists live this evening.

If you want to attend the semi-finals, they are being held at Treehouse Pub, 501 East 6th Street @ 3:00 PM.  See you there.

I've recently announced the visionary entrepreneurs, builders, designers and product managers that are aboard this years Cleveland StartupBus.  Now come meet them and cheer them on before they embark on an amazing journey.  The event is being held at the newly opened XYZ Tavern in Gordon Square.  It's an amazing venue.  The specific details are

XYZ Tavern (Gordon Square off of Detroit Ave)

March 8th from 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM

You can attend by simply showing up or registering on Faceook, Meetup or, Plancast.  Just search for Cleveland 2011 StartupBus Launch party.

For those note familiar with the StartupBus allow me to provide a brief overview

In 2010 a bus left San Francisco en-route to Austin attempting to answer the question, can a team of top entrepreneurial talent from around the world board a bus, self organize, conceive, build, and launch a business while traveling to SxSWi (South by Southwest Interactive).  Then, upon arrival in Austin, pitch their business to top angel investors, venture capitalists and incubators to receive funding.

The short answer is yes.  Products were conceived and launched, funding was received and, two participants walked off the bus and took their ideas and bus experience into YCombinator.  Since Austin last year one raised 1.5 million dollars for their business and the other was just acquired by Zynga. 

Building on success from our first year the StartupBus has returned as a national competition where emerging entrepreneurial cities compete against one another by placing their top twenty-five builders, designer and visionaries on a bus to conceive, self-organize, build and launch a new products or services by the time they reach Austin.  Once in Austin a panel of top investors, founders, builders and visionaries will pick the winning team and declare a winning city the next Silicon Valley.

Through this annual competition StartupBus is building an ever-growing alumni network of this nations top talent from entrepreneurial cities from across the country.

This year Cleveland has a team competing in the national competition and I'm pleased to announce the completion of the selection process.  It was a tough job sifting through the almost two hundred amazing applicatns and picking only twenty-five.  That being said, I am pleaesd to announce this years team

Cole Worley Business Development
Tim Kearney Business Development
Jeff Kinsey Business Development
Ed Buchholz Designer
Doug McKay Designer
Gabe Bridger Designer
Scott Meier Designer
Steven Farrell Designer
John Burgess Designer
Faith Chiang Designer
Michael Miklavcic Developer
Anthony Coble Developer
Jonathan Penn Developer
Joe Cannatti  Developer
Andrew Kavanaugh Developer
Jonathan Knapp  Developer
James West Developer
Kevin Solorio Developer
Greg Svitak  Developer
Christopher Laco Developer
Mike Wisnewski Developer
David Justice Developer
Mark Brenneman Developer

In standard StartupBus tradition the bus will take an amazing incubator, accelearotor and, venture capitalist infused route to Austin.  At each stop the buspreneurs will pitch their idea and product in its current state and obtain critical (and it's usually very critcal) feedback.  Additionally, the buspreneurs will get valuable individual feedback and coaching from these organizations top mentors.  This year the Cleveland bus will stop at

• AlphaLabs in Pittsburgh, PA
• SproutBox in Bloomington, IN
• Tech Church in Dallas, TX
• Capital Factory in Austin, TX

That's an amazing line up that should make any entrepreneur salivate. 

While traveling we will be tweeting, blogging, live broadcasting, uploading videos and more (not sure what's left, but we will find it and do it).  Additionally, the StartupBus will be launching a nationwide interactive game Tuesday morning as the buses depart from their host cities.  Stay tuned on www.startupbus.com and the Twitter hashtag #startupbus for more details on how to partiipate.

Lastly, check out the bus they will be riding down to Austin.